Electric Boats

[Ronaldo47]

A relative who works for Ford, tells me that most electric cars seem to have been bought as second cars, used for short journeys, rather as replacements for the main vehicle. Certainly all the accounts of actual long distance trips that have appeared in the motoring press in the past couple of months have not been calculated to encourage changing to pure electric, quite the opposite!

 

While there are now automotive batteries that can be charged rapidly, you can only make two consecutive rapid charges without irreversibly damaging the battery. Ford have just released a  video of their electric Mustang. To facilitate rapid charge, the battery has had to be provided with a refrigeration unit to  keep the temperature down, another thing that reduces the  effective charging efficiency. My own understanding of battery technology, wearing my hat as a retired former professional electrical engineer, is that there is normally a trade- off between rate of charge and charging efficiency, meaning that the faster the charge, the lower the  proportion of energy put in that can be taken out again. Likewise, local battery storage to top up the grid will always involve some loss of energy due to the double conversion. However, the main problem with the grid seems to be that the increasing proportion of electricity from renewable sources is affecting the frequency stability of the grid. You used to be able to rely on a synchronous-motored mains electric clock to show the correct time to within a few seconds: these days mine can vary by at least 30 seconds either way relative to the Greenwich time pips of Radio 4 FM. With the possibly sole exception of hydro-electricity, renewable sources either generate power at DC (solar), or at a non-synchronous frequency (wind).  The grid has traditionally relied on the mechanical inertia of massive rotating generators to act as an electrical flywheel to keep the grid frequency stable: the electronic DC-AC and AC -DC- AC convertors used to convert solar and wind power to 50Hz, rely on the grid as the reference frequency for their final AC conversion stages. There was a massive blackout a few months ago when one large renewable source tripped, causing several other renewable generators to trip because the remaining conventional generators were unable to maintain the frequency within the specified limits. As far as I know, a solution to this problem, which has been known about for many years, is still awaited. 

 

I don't own a boat myself, but have taken canal holidays on average every other year since 1976. To me, one of the joys of canal holidays has been the ability to moor up at remote locations, enjoying the peace and quiet of the  countryside, and watching the sun go down over the fields. The idea of having a network of charging stations at marinas and the like would be akin to hiring a camper van for a touring holiday and having to spend each night at a motorway service area. 

Edited July 23, 2020 by Ronaldo47
Typo

[IanD]

11 minutes ago, IanD said:

The issue with tidal power --which is indeed very reliable, and spread out evenly over time around the UK -- is that though it can generate what looks like a *lot* of power, it's still only a small fraction of what we consume, and much lower than "on-off" renewables like wind and especially solar. If you look at the figures in SEWTHA by David MacKay (absolutely essential reading, and free) the most optimistic figure for tidal power is less than a tenth of total demand, and not much more than a tenth of total available power from renewables -- the attached page shows (optimistic) estimates of (maximum) deliverable power, do note the huge areas/sizes/costs that are needed to make this work, as well as the total estimated cost of about 15k per person which is about a trillion (10^12) pounds...

 

[SEWTHA is one of the very few sources which doesn't just go "woo-hoo, that's a *lot* of power" but looks at how the numbers add up compared to actual requirements]

 

And here's another vital column which is missing -- cost per kWh of average power delivered. In increasing order...

 

Nuclear -- 63

Tidal lagoons -- 64

Heat pumps -- 83

Clean coal -- 90

Onshore wind -- 107

Waste incinerators -- 127

Tidal stream -- 159

Offshore wind -- 186

Severn barrage -- 310

Wave farms -- 330

Desert solar -- 360

Solar hot water -- 1200

PV farms in UK -- 1600

 

Edited July 23, 2020 by IanD

[IanD]

14 minutes ago, Ronaldo47 said:

I don't own a boat myself, but have taken canal holidays on average every other year since 1976. To me, one of the joys of canal holidays has been the ability to moor up at remote locations, enjoying the peace and quiet of the  countryside, and watching the sun go down over the fields. The idea of having a network of charging stations at marinas and the like would be akin to hiring a camper van for a touring holidsy and having to spend each night at a motorway service area. 

But you're quite happy to keep burning scarce (and CO2-generating) fossil fuels in a noisy diesel rather than charge up an electric boat and travel in silence?

 

Yes I know that all the narrowboats in the UK added together probably contribute about a thousandth of the CO2 that road vehicles do, but that's not the point -- if you enjoy the peace and quiet of the countryside, surely you should be all in favour of electric boats?

 

(and the obvious place to put charging stations would be at water points -- you have to stop anyway every day or two for water for maybe half an hour or more, this is exactly how long it would take to recharge the batteries)

[Derek R.]

5 hours ago, IanD said:

You're the one who said the big problem was that the grid couldn't supply the power for EV (post #31), several replies explained why this won't actually be the case.

 

Walking away from the discussion because your arguments have been rebutted won't make you any less wrong... ?

It took you three years to respond, why shouldn't I take three years. Not walking away from any rebuttal, just your opinion. Just because mine is different, does not make either your opinion right and mine wrong, or vice versa.

 

Let's stick to historic electric boats

[IanD]

2 hours ago, Derek R. said:

It took you three years to respond, why shouldn't I take three years. Not walking away from any rebuttal, just your opinion. Just because mine is different, does not make either your opinion right and mine wrong, or vice versa.

 

Let's stick to historic electric boats

Oops, should have read the date... ?

[cuthound]

As someonw who has worked in the power industry i can tell you the problem is not whether the grid can cope or not, it is the cost and impact of upgrading the local distribution network from substation to home.

 

The grid is virtually all overhead lines of aluminium cable, so quick and relatively cheap to upgrade. 

 

The local distribution comprised substations (copper wired tranformers) and copper cables, which are mainly buried.

 

The transformer and local cabling are sized for local use (which was increasing annually before the introduction of BEV charging points) using a diversity factor, because not everyone will pull their maximum demand at the same time. If everyone tried to then the breakers protecting the transfor and cables would trip. Upgrading the local  distribution network is costly, disruptive and time consuming.

 

Yes demand can be limited for a while by using SMART meters to increase charges at times of peak load, but with the installation gas boilers soon to be outlawed, the electrical load will increase as people are forced to use electric boilers or heat pumps.

 

The upgrading of the local network needs to begin now if localised power disruption is to be avoided, and I dont see any signs of this happening.

[Cinimod]

5 hours ago, cuthound said:

The upgrading of the local network needs to begin now if localised power disruption is to be avoided, and I dont see any signs of this happening

I totally agree with you on this - there is going to be an ever increasing need to supply electricity and we are going to see an increase in these levels before it decreases.

One potential way for it to local-side decrease would be with the introduction of autonomous vehicles and charging zones - then you would only need to be able to provide 'mass' power to certain areas.  Unfortunately - the only motor company who is really preparing for this is Tesla - and even they are still working with a plug-in solution rather than an induction based solution, which would be the most sensible for autonomous charging.

 

Regards the banning of gas boilers - this will only be on newbuild properties, which they should install solar and batteries into at the same time if the developers have any sense.

If you listen to the podcast from Fullycharged with Moixa - it is a well thought way of implementing all these systems without having to re-lay loads of cabling (as least on new houses) - https://fullycharged.show/podcasts/podcast-69/ and it is possible to retrofit too.

 

On 23/07/2020 at 16:33, IanD said:

Nuclear -- 63

Tidal lagoons -- 64

Heat pumps -- 83

Clean coal -- 90

Onshore wind -- 107

Waste incinerators -- 127

Tidal stream -- 159

So - Ian - from this extra column... it appears that Tidal Lagoons are a very low cost per kWh energy source?
It is important to bear in mind this would only be PART of the solution

This article here - https://www.greenmatch.co.uk/blog/2016/10/tidal-and-wind-energy-in-the-uk - does have some different figures
With Onshore wind being in the region of £52 / kWh by 2020 - its conclusion is also that the UK would benefit mostly from a mix of wind and tide based energy solutions.

 

 

[IanD]

Tidal lagoons are indeed cheap, they're basically a big wall and some turbines -- but like many other renewable energy sources note the sheer area of them that are needed, and think of the NIMBY objections ...

 

As you say local cabling is a bigger issue than the grid and needs to be solved -- my point was that all the doomsayers saying that grid or power generation capacity is the problem are wrong. The point that investment needs to start now is exactly what I was saying, and that the government is pretty much ignoring.

 

Induction power for charging cars is only proposed by people who don't understand about power electronics -- apart from the sheer amount of EM energy needed (the equivalent of standing over a longwave transmitter capable of covering the whole of Europe), it's lossy and would cost an absolute fortune. A cable is safer, more reliable, more efficient, and cheaper -- if you're sitting over a coil anyway, why not get out of the car and plug it in? Wireless charging is fine for phones and laptops at power levels of tens of watts, it's complete lunacy for cars at hundreds of kilowatts. Yes I'm an engineer...

Edited July 24, 2020 by IanD

[cuthound]

9 hours ago, IanD said:

Tidal lagoons are indeed cheap, they're basically a big wall and some turbines -- but like many other renewable energy sources note the sheer area of them that are needed, and think of the NIMBY objections ...

 

As you say local cabling is a bigger issue than the grid and needs to be solved -- my point was that all the doomsayers saying that grid or power generation capacity is the problem are wrong. The point that investment needs to start now is exactly what I was saying, and that the government is pretty much ignoring.

 

Induction power for charging cars is only proposed by people who don't understand about power electronics -- apart from the sheer amount of EM energy needed (the equivalent of standing over a longwave transmitter capable of covering the whole of Europe), it's lossy and would cost an absolute fortune. A cable is safer, more reliable, more efficient, and cheaper -- if you're sitting over a coil anyway, why not get out of the car and plug it in? Wireless charging is fine for phones and laptops at power levels of tens of watts, it's complete lunacy for cars at hundreds of kilowatts. Yes I'm an engineer...

 

And the environmental impact. From an engineering viewpoint the Severn Barrage is easy but its construction would destroy a significant part of the Severn Estuary  ecosfystem. 

 

The obvious answer is to massively reduce our energy consumption, and if it were any other species causing this problem would be resolved by a culling programme.

Edited July 25, 2020 by cuthound

[Derek R.]

11 minutes ago, cuthound said:

(snipped)

 . . if it were any other species causing this problem would be resolved by a culling programme.

Ooh! A current topic . . .

 

Let's not go there on CWDF

[magpie patrick]

8 minutes ago, Derek R. said:

Ooh! A current topic . . .

With power and potential too!  

 

9 minutes ago, Derek R. said:

Let's not go there on CWDF

No, you're right, lets not

 

On leccy driven thingies, my big concern is eggs and baskets . Everything driven by leccy connected to any kind of widespread grid makes our entire infrastructure very vulnerable. Probably five days from power shut down to the beginnings of famine. 

[IanD]

3 hours ago, cuthound said:

 

And the environmental impact. From an engineering viewpoint the Severn Barrage is easy but its construction would destroy a significant part of the Severn Estuary  ecosfystem. 

 

The obvious answer is to massively reduce our energy consumption, and if it were any other species causing this problem would be resolved by a culling programme.

It is the obvious answer, but unfortunately most people are in favour of green planet-saving measures only as long as they don't mean huge changes in their lifestyle, and the developed world is built on consuming lots of cheap energy.

 

Until/unless the planet catches fire and people start dying to force this to change, the best we can probably hope for is a gradual reduction in energy consumption (better efficiency, less waste) and a faster decrease in the use of fossil fuels to provide this energy.

 

Which means more renewables, which means there will inevitably be some negative impacts -- that on the Severn ecosystem has to be balanced out against the much bigger positive impact of it replacing gigawatts of CO2-generating power sources.

 

Anyone who thinks that huge structural changes can be made with zero local impact is living in cloud-cuckoo land, because every green energy source has some negative impact somewhere. If we object to all of them on this basis then it will be impossible to solve the problem of climate change, and we'll all die gasping that at least we saved some wildlife.

 

Oh I forgot, they died too... ?

Edited July 25, 2020 by IanD

[Derek R.]

2 hours ago, magpie patrick said:

(snipped)

On leccy driven thingies, my big concern is eggs and baskets . Everything driven by leccy connected to any kind of widespread grid makes our entire infrastructure very vulnerable. Probably five days from power shut down to the beginnings of famine. 

I would much rather hear about previous electric boats and their uses, than any limitations on present power supplies either possible or probable.

However, I copied some notes down regarding the desire to expand on renewables and Electric Vehicles:

 

'Last year, the House of Commons Technical and Science Committee reported that the Government were to bring forward the date of banning new cars and vans powered by fossil fuels to 2035. But that same Committee declared the manufacture of same vehicles produces far more emissions during manufacture, and as said vehicles would need to be replaced over time, such emissions would continue and that long term personal transport would, of necessity, become so expensive that only the wealthy could afford them, leaving foot, pedal and public transport for the remainder.

 

Autoexpress wrote to the Climate Change Committee stating that; if the 31.5million cars were replaced by electric vehicles by 2050, it would require twice the annual global supply of cobalt; all of the World's Rare Earth supply of Neodymium; 75% of the World's Lithium; and 50% of the World's Copper, to manufacture electric motors, cabling and so forth - and that is just for the UK. Running such vehicles would require an increase in power generation for charging by 20%. The roads may become congestion free except for those who could afford to run such vehicles, and whilst they may attract subsidised road taxes at present, the road network would still need funding - but from whom?'

 

Electricity from renewables (such a strange term. Do turbines need no maintenance or periodic replacement? Wind and tides move - but there are gaps) is known to be the most expensive form of electricity. And not constant or reliable to the point that the supply must be matched to the demand in half hourly segments (timewise) necessitating fired up back up generation to switch in and out as required.

 

We are bombarded with gadgets to make life and lifestyle easier and more 'convenient'. We are seldom told how often said gadgets need replacing and as they become addictive, we crave them all the more. There is much to be said for a simpler life, which is one of the attractions that drew me to living afloat just over forty years ago. Diesel in the tank, windlass in my belt. Electricity sparks off too much argument. No more.

[magpie patrick]

12 minutes ago, Derek R. said:

I would much rather hear about previous electric boats and their uses, than any limitations on present power supplies either possible or probable.

 

Thank you for the notes that followed this, and I would agree with the sentiment that I have quoted.

 

I know far less about boats generally than I do of canal and river infrastructure. So what follows is half remembered snippets from a lifetime of learning primarily about canal infrastructure. 

 

Electric propulsion never made any serious inroads into cargo carrying boats in the UK - most of the bits I have read that are before, say, 1950 involved pleasure launches on the Thames. I think some operators even put electrical components on view on diesel powered craft in order to kid the customers that the boat was electric - I assume the engines were quieter than the ST2 in Lutine Belle...

 

France went for a bit of lateral thinking and tried electric horses rather than electric boats - this worked although these ran on towpath railways that were single track and boats had to exchange "horse" when they met.

 

We had at least one electric tunnel tug at Harecastle, other people know more about it than I do. I seem to recall an experiment with overhead supply for boats near Kinver too, powered from the adjacent tramway? 

 

The above is the sum total of my knowledge and may not be 100% accurate

 

On a more modern note (and something I referred to 3 years ago when this thread started) the Coal Canal hosts a small (but now rather bigger) fleet of electric dayboats. They are very popular and I think the operator likes them because of their green credentials and partly because the hirers can't do much to damage either the propulsion unit or themselves, however they make a surprising amount of engine noise - I'd say a good water cooled outboard is quieter.   

Edited July 25, 2020 by magpie patrick

[MoominPapa]

On 23/07/2020 at 16:26, Ronaldo47 said:

There was a massive blackout a few months ago when one large renewable source tripped, causing several other renewable generators to trip because the remaining conventional generators were unable to maintain the frequency within the specified limits. As far as I know, a solution to this problem, which has been known about for many years, is still awaited. 

 

Not true, I read the report. The frequency drop was a result of load exceeding supply, and that was compounded by generation tripping because the of the frequency drop which shouldn't have. There was nothing inherent in renewable sources which contributed to the event.

 

MP.

 

1 hour ago, Derek R. said:

Electricity from renewables (such a strange term. Do turbines need no maintenance or periodic replacement? Wind and tides move - but there are gaps) is known to be the most expensive form of electricity. 

You're being deliberately obtuse. "Renewable" refers to source of the energy, not the conversion equipment. ONce you burn a pile of coal or a tank of diesel it's gone. The wind or the sun will still be there tomorrow. Renewable costs are dropping rapidly and already undercut much conventional generation.

 

MP.

[IanD]

2 hours ago, Derek R. said:

Autoexpress wrote to the Climate Change Committee stating that; if the 31.5million cars were replaced by electric vehicles by 2050, it would require twice the annual global supply of cobalt; all of the World's Rare Earth supply of Neodymium; 75% of the World's Lithium; and 50% of the World's Copper, to manufacture electric motors, cabling and so forth - and that is just for the UK. Running such vehicles would require an increase in power generation for charging by 20%. The roads may become congestion free except for those who could afford to run such vehicles, and whilst they may attract subsidised road taxes at present, the road network would still need funding - but from whom?'

Autoexpress are hardly an unbiased source here, given that they're pretty much all petrolheads (go and read some of the articles and editorials). For electric cars to massively increase in number and have charging facilities it's blindingly obvious that things will have to be done differently from how they are now when their numbers are tiny, and people in the industry are well aware of this -- which is why Tesla are about to introduce batteries with no cobalt, and everyone else is working to greatly reduce the amounts used.

 

Similar changes are going on to reduce use of neodymium, and the copper figure is complete hogwash -- an electric car uses about 50-60kg of copper compared to 20kg for a conventional car, worldwide mineable copper reserves are estimate at about 6 billion tons, which is enough to build 100 billion electric cars (if it's used for nothing else).

 

Lithium may become the first pinch point, which is why there's so much research going on into non-lithium battery chemistries -- for example using sodium, of which there is rather a lot since it's the sixth most common element on the planet...

 

It's extremely unlikely that running out of materials to build electric cars will be an issue, any more than it is for IC cars -- which is of course the big problem, if everyone in the expanding third world decides they want cars just like in the West.

 

Which means this won't happen either, other forms of transport will be used instead of wasteful single-occupant cars, and transport demand will drop like it has during Covid-19 as people work and meet remotely. This is in the same category as the prediction in the last century that the streets of London would soon be six feet deep in horse-shit as more and more people could afford horses and the population went up, of course what happened is that new transport technology came along.

 

What is certain is that current trends of increasing energy consumption and car ownership (and flying abroad for a stag weekend) are unsustainable and big changes are needed. In the meantime while cars exist in large numbers, EVs (powered from renewables) are a far better option than fossil-fuelled IC vehicles, and there are no real technological barriers to EVs largely replacing ICs -- assuming this happens before cars largely disapper, which also might never happen...

Edited July 25, 2020 by IanD

[nicknorman]

37 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

"Renewable" refers to source of the energy, not the conversion equipment. ONce you burn a pile of coal or a tank of diesel it's gone. The wind or the sun will still be there tomorrow. Renewable costs are dropping rapidly and already undercut much conventional generation.

 

MP.

Not really, it just refers to a finite source of energy which will last longer than fossil fuels.

[RAB]

Don't for one minute know or understand all the pros / cons of the following but was listening to a "Energy bod" (not sure exactly his expertise!), but he said they were currently researching, for lorries, the use of Hydrogen fuel via a fuel cell to electric motors for drive, with intermediate electric storage (batteries) to cater for high electric loads (starting, acceleration etc.). Guess if it becomes viable then a potential for canal boats as well, pending a hydrogen supply system of course!!!!

[Cinimod]

16 hours ago, IanD said:

Induction power for charging cars is only proposed by people who don't understand about power electronics -

Hi Ian,

Thank you and great to have your thoughts on induction chraging...  what do you think to this podcast - fullycharged - Induction @ 50-75Kw range?

And the PR Release for a Jaguar iPace taxi rank that uses induction charging; (PR NEWSWIRE)

 

Also - regards NIMBY on the tidal lagoons - the ones proposed in Cardiff would be for public recreation too - and provide local long term jobs and a site for olympic training - and a nature park - seems like something nice to have

 

6 hours ago, cuthound said:

From an engineering viewpoint the Severn Barrage is easy but its construction would destroy a significant part of the Severn Estuary  ecosfystem. 

The plans I am looking at is NOT the Barrage, which I totally agree would be an environmental disaster - the ones I am looking at is for a Lagoon to the side of the channel.

 

6 hours ago, magpie patrick said:

Probably five days from power shut down to the beginnings of famine.

That is why we need to develop a distributed grid system, with renewable power spread out across the country, rather than concentrating it in giant power stations... This would be more efficient - a bit like develoving government to the local area (oops, probably, should not go there either!)

 

2 hours ago, Derek R. said:

long term personal transport would, of necessity, become so expensive that only the wealthy could afford them, leaving foot, pedal and public transport for the remainder.

Hi Derek  - Some people think we have already passed peak car ownership - the youth of today are not so keen on even learning to drive.

More and more car clubs are popping up, where it is easy to just go and grab a car for the period you need it...  on average most people's cars spend over 90% of their time parked - so with car clubs and (coming soon) automous vehicles people will most probably not buy a car, but use it on an as an when basis - yes, there will be exceptions and people who will still need to own cars (especially in rural communities) but as more and more people are moving to cities - car ownership is declining.  Indeed the share of car ownership is moving even more from private individuals to lease companies - mostly leasing to other companies.

 

2 hours ago, Derek R. said:

Electricity from renewables (such a strange term. Do turbines need no maintenance or periodic replacement? Wind and tides move - but there are gaps) is known to be the most expensive form of electricity.

Please, can you let me know where you got that statistic from, as it is my understanding that Onshore Wind is now the lowest cost form of new energy? (BLOOMBERG)

Yes, they do need maintenance, but a lot less and a lot less costly than a gas fired power station, which is our main alternative at the moment.

 

In the graph below - Grey is Nuclear (considered a green technology, interestingly) Orange is Combined Cycle Gas Turbine, Biomas is Brown, Blue is Wind and Yellow is Solar.

Blue is pumped hydro (Like Dinorwig) So yes, last year - most of our power came from gas... https://gridwatch.co.uk/demand/percent

 

 

This year, a lot more from Wind, and also a lot more from Solar since COVID grounded a load of aeroplanes!

 

I do agree that by themselves Solar and Wind are not the answer to the UK's energy needs - but it can vastly help (along with Micro Geothermal)

 

40 minutes ago, IanD said:

This is in the same category as the prediction in the last century that the streets of London would soon be six feet deep in horse-shit as more and more people could afford horses and the population went up, of course what happened is that new transport technology came along

Indeed - and it was due to a parallel situation in New York, where they had 3 -5 story piles of horse manure, that the Model T Ford became so popular...  the first cars were electric though - it was just the charging and range that was an issue.... I think it is being proven now that it is no longer the case.  Yes the charging infrastructure needs working on - but with scheme like https://www.plugshare.com/ and https://co-charger.com/

 

 

[MoominPapa]

25 minutes ago, RAB said:

Don't for one minute know or understand all the pros / cons of the following but was listening to a "Energy bod" (not sure exactly his expertise!), but he said they were currently researching, for lorries, the use of Hydrogen fuel via a fuel cell to electric motors for drive, with intermediate electric storage (batteries) to cater for high electric loads (starting, acceleration etc.). Guess if it becomes viable then a potential for canal boats as well, pending a hydrogen supply system of course!!!!

Yes, but boats don't generally need short-term high power. They don't have starting surges or acceleration, I guess if your fuel cell was really anaemic you might want to supplement reverse power for stopping.  The power source for boats post fossil fuels will be entirely determined by what road transport uses. At the moment, BEV are way ahead of hydrogen.

 

MP.

1 hour ago, nicknorman said:

Not really, it just refers to a finite source of energy which will last longer than fossil fuels.

On the timescale where the sun goes supernova, and the planet is vapourised, yes. Or were you thinking of universal heat-death? No energy source anywhere then. FOr practical purposes renewable energy goes on forever, or at least longer than until you have other things to worry about.

 

MP.

[nicknorman]

11 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

 

On the timescale where the sun goes supernova, and the planet is vapourised, yes. Or were you thinking of universal heat-death? No energy source anywhere then. FOr practical purposes renewable energy goes on forever, or at least longer than until you have other things to worry about.

 

MP.

A planet that didn’t rotate faster than its orbit wouldn’t have tides or weather or wind. So by the general reversibility of things, it follows that extracting energy from tide or wind slows down the rotation of the earth. Will the earth become tidally locked to  the sun (ie 1 rotation per year) before the latter goes supernova? Probably. So we are doomed.

[MoominPapa]

21 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

A planet that didn’t rotate faster than its orbit wouldn’t have tides or weather or wind. So by the general reversibility of things, it follows that extracting energy from tide or wind slows down the rotation of the earth. Will the earth become tidally locked to  the sun (ie 1 rotation per year) before the latter goes supernova? Probably. So we are doomed.

Err, tides are generated by the moon, (which _is_ rotationally locked to the earth.) An Earth rotationally locked would have the same side always facing the sun, which would be rather hot, and a side always facing deep space, which is rather cold. Plenty of energy input to drive the atmospheric heat engine there. We'd all be dead for other reasons, of course, but you'd still be able to extract energy using windmills if we weren't. Totally with you on the last sentence.

 

MP.

 

[Derek R.]

Nikola Tesla allegedly was able to power a car from electricity collected from the air via an antenna on his car. It is also alleged that J. P. Morgan was stated as saying: "If we can't put a meter on it, we don't want it". This has apparently been misquoted by some as being stated 'If we can put a meter on it, we don't want it'. From a banker, that does not make sense.

 

Several of my links in bookmarks have been pulled, or the websites moved elsewhere, I do not know which, but here are a few:

https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2019/07/WindPokerWeb.pdf?utm_source=CCNet+Newsletter&utm_campaign=6ff2c7e9ce-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_07_28_09_58_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_fe4b2f45ef-6ff2c7e9ce-36465045

https://www.wind-watch.org/faq-electricity.php

https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/tag/electric-cars/

https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/tag/electricity/

https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2020/02/21/no-airports-no-imports-welcome-to-year-zero/#more-43692

https://www.bmreports.com/bmrs/?q=eds/main

https://tinyurl.com/u7eo9q8

https://www.thegwpf.com/gwpf-statement-on-the-proposed-net-zero-2050-emissions-target/

https://www.masterresource.org/general-problems/wind-not-power-iii/

https://www.manhattan-institute.org/green-energy-revolution-near-impossible

 

This is a subject that I would rather not see on CWDF, especially in an Historic & Heritage section. It smacks of far too much politics and prejudice, and debate centring on various parties pulling one another apart for the dubious pleasure of 'because they can' and I have no interest in feeding or furthering such a debate.

 

Edited July 25, 2020 by Derek R.

[fatmanblue]

in the early 1980s, the Original Boat Co. in Evesham ran a 'fleet' (I cannot be sure of the size) of electric hire boats and , thanks to the foresight and progressive thinking of the late David Hutchings, there was a 'network' of charging points around the Avon Ring.  UANT at time offered a 50% reduction on licence fees for electric boats.

 

This is a vague memory, as I was born in 1973 so was quite young at the time.

 

In hindsight, the Avon Ring was possibly rather less suitable for electric boats than other rings, due to the possibility of strongly adverse river currents (as anyone who has experienced the Severn or the Avon on a bad day will attest). 

 

On the face of it, narrowboats are more suitable for electric propulsion than most other vehicles, as weight is almost immaterial.  However, as others have alluded to, the individual nature of narrowboats counts against them as regards cost and reliability.  You can buy a Ford Fiesta (relatively) cheaply because they make 22,000 of them a week, all largely the same.

[Cinimod]

9 hours ago, Derek R. said:

This is a subject that I would rather not see on CWDF, especially in an Historic & Heritage section. It smacks of far too much politics and prejudice, and debate centring on various parties pulling one another apart for the dubious pleasure of 'because they can' and I have no interest in feeding or furthering such a debate.

Hello Derek, 

 

You are right - and I apologise for going so far off topic especially in the Historic and Heritage section - it probably should have been in pub talk.

I am certainly interested in the debate - as a practical green, rather than a we must do it at all costs - a change will only happen if it is acceptable to the masses.

 

Look forward to haring more about historic electric boats.  Thank you